


A Coda for Rough Landings

by MajorEnglishEsquire



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Supernatural Season 08, Team Free Will
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-03
Updated: 2013-05-03
Packaged: 2017-12-10 06:28:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/782879
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MajorEnglishEsquire/pseuds/MajorEnglishEsquire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An ending to episode 08.21, The Great Escapist.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Coda for Rough Landings

**Author's Note:**

> Original posting on Tumblr, [here](http://apocalypse-patisserie.tumblr.com/post/49491979216/a-coda-for-rough-landings).
> 
> I do not own the rights to these characters, setting, show, etc. No harm is intended.

Dean pushes Sam back away and points at the Impala. "Move 'er to the side of the road." When Sam hesitates, half-way to Castiel's side, Dean crouches down and begins hauling Cas up himself. "GO," he demands.

He pulls Cas's right arm over his shoulders and Cas manages to get one leg steady underneath himself. The other, not so much. With an arm around his middle, even through the layers, Dean can feel how tightly strung Cas is. Despite the gasping, and what looks like possibly heavy blood loss, Cas is still in flight mode more than anything. Dean takes a tighter grip and just shakes Cas, real hard, once.

"Hey," he looks down, catches Castiel's eye. "No," he commands.

Cas rattles out another breath and closes his eyes for a moment. Nodding or nodding out.

The headlights swing back around and away from them again, leaving them back in the dark.

Dean tries Cas's legs once more, pushing them both up with his knees.

Sam's heading back out to them. Kid can't even lift himself right now and he's planning on hauling half an angel around.

"Shut up, Dean," Sam snaps before he can say anything. When he's close enough he can see Sam looks a little more than freaked, so he lets Sam take some of Castiel's weight. Together they get him to the open back seat.

Cas sits down heavy and sinking over his own knees. Sam is the first to crouch in front of him, pawing at his jackets to reveal a ragged, gaping, bloody wound on his side. "Ffffuck," Sam hisses as he pulls the shirt away from the mess of torn skin.

Cas is falling forward a little. Dean crowds in and steadies him by his shoulder.

"Cas, what did this?"

His eyes are falling closed for longer moments at a time. "Anahhh. Angel. Blade," he eventually gets out.

Sam looks up to his brother. "He's not healing."

"Cas," Dean looks to address him and has to palm his neck to get him to open his eyes back up. "Cas, why can't you heal?"

"It's like last time, isn't it? Cas? With Rachel?" Sam turns to Dean again. "When we were getting the phoenix ash and--and he had to--," Sam makes a fierce sort of grabbing motion, "he needed access to Bobby's soul to repair himself."

It jogs Dean's memory. "The solonoscopy." He crouches on Cas's other side, "Cas. Will that work?"

Cas doesn't answer. His eyes slide between them and his expression doesn't change.

"Hey, seriously man, you're circling the drain here. Do we stitch you up? Will that even work? Or do you need--" Dean stops, just for a second. Cas can't reach out and touch some Sammy soul. Dean won't allow that. Sam is barely functional as-is.

Dean reaches down and starts yanking at his own belt.

"Sammy, behind me," he instructs. "You lock my arms tight as you can. Cas you gotta--"

"No," Cas finally growls. "It's too much to risk. If I'm not careful-" another ragged breath "-you could explode."

Dean pauses to consider this. "Well," he finally says, "I let you do it to Sam," the SamBot, at least, "and if Bobby can handle it," he shrugs. "I'll handle it, Cas."

"I'm hardly in any condition for caution ri--"

Dean reaches forward and yanks Cas back out of the car by his coat lapels and props him against the side. He can't get Cas to look him in the eye. Maybe there’s still some deep-rooted program running, demanding that he kill Dean on sight. That Naomi bitch did a number on him.

She did a number on _them_.

Dean grabs Cas below the jaw and doesn't let Cas blink away.

"You didn't come out here, you didn't run all the way here, just to tell us your last words. You're gonna let us fix you, _**lookit me**_ ," he demands when Cas's eyes begin to slide away again. His eyes snap back up. "You're gonna let me fix you. It's gonna be fine. Then you can come home, pass out, hide, whatever it is you gotta do. But you're not bleeding out on the way there."

Dean feels Sam, behind him, shuffle a safe enough distance away, giving them a minute.

"So will stitches work?" he demands.

Cas shakes his head minutely in Dean's grasp.

"If you touch my soul. Will that work?"

A gust huffs out of Cas's nose and over Dean's wrist.

"Or maybe mine won't work?" Dean wonders. "Too black around the edges, maybe."

Cas's hands reach out this time and grip Dean's jacket.

"It will work," he tugs, "better than most."

"Sam," Dean calls. He lets go of Cas and puts his belt between his teeth, then reaches behind him to accept Sam's hold.

The Winchesters steady themselves. Sam is solid against Dean's back. Cas pushes up a sleeve. It snags and he yanks it open, ripping the cloth with his shaking hand.

Dean doesn't stop watching Cas until the pain grips him and makes him bellow.

«»

They're reversed, now. Dean looking up from his crumpled position on the back seat to Cas standing over him.

He's getting his breath back but it feels like he's been climbing trees for ten hours.

Cas is pristine again, all straight lines and firm face.

"I think you get shotgun. I'm gonna pass out. Somebody's gotta keep Sam awake while he drives."

Cas turns. "Sam," he holds out a hand to him. When Sam is close enough, Cas grabs his wrist and curls down into the car, over Dean. He curves his hand over the side of Dean's face and the world moves all around them.

«»

Cas gives Dean the dignity of having Sam help him to bed so he doesn't feel quite so much like a swooning princess. Then Sam heads back out to retrieve their bags and lock the car and the Men of Letters bunker up for the night.

Dean has enough energy to shed his shoes but then lets his bed have him, collapsing back on top of the covers.

Cas hasn't been here before. Dean really wanted to give him the grand tour if he ever showed up. Welcome him home and cook him meatloaf, the whole nine. But he can barely move and Cas only seems to be interested in their surroundings so far as they're not _Dean_ and _staring at Dean_ and pointedly trying not to make _Dean_ the center of attention. He just drifts there in the center of the room, eyes skipping over the record collection and the gleaming knives on the wall.

"I lost the tablet," Cas says simply, more to the lamp and little picture of Mary and the room at large than anyone else.

"We'll deal with it," Dean sighs. "Cas, it'll be okay."

"I'm not so sure," Cas says to the carpet.

Dean raises an arm and makes a grabby hand. "C'mere."

His eyes are greedy in being invited to settle upon Dean. He's checking him up and down, drinking him in. When he drifts close he says, "Thank you, Dean."

"Meh," Dean mutters. "No problem. I'll be fine in the morning, right?"

"No. Yes, you will be, but, no, I meant _thank you_ , Dean. Everything is. Is." Castiel swallows and his eyes settle on Dean's. "I have been too far from your soul for far too long. I had. I had forgotten--" He stops and simply looks at a loss.

"C'mere," Dean repeats and reaches up further this time, to pluck at Cas's old tie until he can twine it around his fingers and tug Cas down.

Castiel sinks to the side of the bed, mindful enough not to sit on Dean, but snug to his side, his thigh up against Dean's ribs, knee to his elbow. Dean keeps pulling.

"Kiss me goodnight," he whispers, "it's the least you can do after I let you cop a feel."

Dean never would have expected Cas's eyes to look like he was being given a gift when this happened. Maybe alien-lost or shocked-wide but not _this_ , not _thankful_.

He sinks his fingers into Castiel's mop of hair and closes his eyes and settles back and gets himself kissed, long and slow and warm. He slackens his mouth and Cas invites himself in, diving and diving again and Dean lets it go on until he can feel a tug of arousal that he can do absolutely nothing about tonight, in the state he’s in.

"Cas," he says between the last few pecks. "Cas. You came home."

Cas curves over him fully to rest his mouth against Dean's brow, to just breathe there for a minute, fluttering his hair and pressing his nose and lips to something he wants. Soaking in the company (at last, _at last_ ) of someone who loves him back.

And to Dean's drooping eyelids and drifting mind Cas says, "I needed you."


End file.
